


don't go wasting your emotion

by orphan_account



Category: iCarly
Genre: Angst, Enemies to Friends, F/M, Feels, Friendship, I Can't Believe I Wrote This, I Will Go Down With This Ship, My First Work in This Fandom, Pining, Sam Has Regrets, Sam-Centric, i like that's a tag, i'm ranting in these tags now, it's only T bc i'm unsure abt some of the language and feels, seddie is my ship and i will go down with it, that should have been the first tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:09:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23606560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: "Sam isn't weak. She doesn't feel affection towards things easily (unless they're Carly or food) and she doesn't regret her actions. She's got solid, impenetrable walls."that is, until she meets freddie benson.(or, sam's perspective on the on-screen and off-screen moments between her and freddie, and the progression of their relationship)(title from lay all your love on me by abba)
Relationships: Freddie Benson/Sam Puckett, Spencer Shay/Socko (mentioned)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 85





	don't go wasting your emotion

Sam isn't weak. She doesn't feel affection towards things easily (unless they're Carly or food) and she doesn't regret her actions. She's got solid, impenetrable walls.

She's 11 years old when Fredward Benson walks through the front door of her best friend's apartment one day. She only notes that he's a a chubby nerd, the kind that's easy to pick on and make fun of. She doesn't think of him as any different from the other nubs at school.

"Who're you?" she asks, ripping apart a piece of bacon with her teeth before chewing it up.

"Fredward Benson." He walks forward with a friendly smile on his nubbish little face, hand extended to shake Sam's. "Call me Freddie."

Mistake.

She pops the rest of her bacon into her mouth, holding it between her teeth before grabbing his arm, positioning her feet and back and flipping him over her back down onto the ground. Then she takes the bacon out of her mouth, jumps into the seat near the Shays' computer monitor, and watches him struggle to get up. He's lost the happy and innocent look on his face, replaced with outrage.

It's a little cute, in the way that a little puppy fighting for food only to receive none is adorable.

"What was that for?" His voice rises with indignation, both in volume and pitch, as he stands up and brushes himself off, wincing at the impact to his back.

"What was what for?" Carly asks, stepping off the stairs, brushing her hair out of her face, looking like a pristine, perfect model. Sam would have gagged if she didn't love Carly so much.

Turns out, this little Freddifer kid loves her too.

"Hey, Carly!" he exclaims excitedly, all traces of disappointment washed off his face. Sam rolls her eyes.

"Oh, hi, Freddie. What are you doing here?" she asks, and they discuss random chiz that Sam can't bring herself to listen to or care about as she kicks her legs absentmindedly and rests her cheek in her palm, desperately waiting to get her best friend to herself.

xxx

Sam's harassment of Freddie doesn't end when they begin working closer in iCarly. Not at all. She gives him the worst treatment she's probably given anyone, ensuring he'll hate her for life. She doesn't want to admit she gets any satisfaction out of seeing his little chubby face curl into that now-familiar frown, only brightening up when the supreme force Carly Shay shows up and mediates their arguments, nor does she want to give excuses for why she does it. It's just mindless, cruel fun. She makes sure to trash his morale for his first date, dig at him for everything he does, and give him a wedgie right after all their sentimental moments. She shows him no pity for being used by Valerie for her new webshow, refuses to soften the blow of anything anyone does.

She's starting to see that he's learning to bite back, though, and when he greets her with her best friend by saying, "Hello, ladies," and amending it pointedly to "lady and SAM", she has to admit there's a bit of pride hidden in her expression when she squirts him with cheese sauce. (Only a little, though, because she'd hate to get all sentimental on little Freddie growing a pair.) She would pay more attention to the fact that she was feeling _positive feelings towards Freddie_ but then Jonah walks up and he's all cute with his chicken noises and affinity for picking on nerds and she sort of, well, forgets.

She continues to let this fact slip from her mind when Jonah asks her out, and she tells Carly she's a teeny bit insecure about it, and they get serious, and she doesn't have to hang around Freddie's lovey-dovey faces sent in Carly direction. She's happy with Jonah, she really is. For once, she isn't on par with someone else. She's number one. _Numero uno,_ as Freddie would say in his random bursts of Spanish.

(But she's definitely not thinking about Freddie when she's with Jonah.)

And then she overhears Carly telling Freddie Sam's boyfriend tried to kiss her, and Sam deflates. Well, not visibly. Anyone from the outside looking in would just see her painfully blank face, likely plotting revenge. But Sam is a little broken now, and it sends a funny little pang through her body when Freddie gets mad because maybe, just for a second, she thinks he cares about her.

(It's endlessly stupid for her to hope for such a frivolous and revolting thing, but it's not like Sam wants to live completely without love. Anyways, it breaks her heart a teeny bit more when she realizes Freddie's just defensive because his precious Carly was almost taken away from him, but she forces herself to fill that crack and square her shoulders and rely a little less on the people she spends time around.)

That day, when the whole Jonah thing is over, Sam refuses to admit it to anyone but she's hurt because when will she be anyone's first choice? It sure seems as if that won't come soon.

But then Carly's about to leave and it gives her and Freddie a common mission: not to let that happen. So she fakes Freddie's mom having an injury, and he's so panicked that he lets her touch him, help him, comfort him. She grips his shoulders like a lifeline because she's pretty sure that if she's stuck with an incompetent loser like Freddie to prevent her best friend from leaving them, Carly will likely drift away from them faster than Sam can eat a ham.

She and Freddie are partners in crime for a day, impersonating Spencer and tricking kids into harassing a random grown woman. They lie together and they confess together. They're "we" for a day, a united force. They almost embrace after Carly announces she isn't attending Briarwood, then realize who they are and stiffen and glue their hands back at their sides. 

(This changes nothing in their dynamic. Sam still picks on Freddie, Carly still steps in between, Freddie's still in love with Carly. The sun still shines and the world still spins.)

xxx

Sam's having a good day.

Carly's fridge is stocked, she doesn't have detention or homework (as if she'd do either anyways), it's sunny and nice out, and they've got some real funny bits for iCarly prepared. 

So she's extremely confused when Freddie walks in, his voice all deep, and her head gets all scattered and confused and weird.

She's isn't _attracted_ to him, per se, but she's noticing him a bit more. 

Why?

(Shane walks in and distracts her from the resident geek, and she's eternally grateful. When she looks back at Freddie after her whole boy-chasing-competition with Carly, she realizes it was probably something off with her teenage hormones that day and laughs it off.)

Then their trip to Japan happens, and they win the award for best webshow, and she kind of likes how tightly Freddie squeezes her and the way his heart thumps against her. She kind of likes the way he tickles her when he elusively skirts around Carly's question of how he saved their performance. The best thing is that neither Sam nor Freddie is disgusted by showing affection to each other.

(She passes that one off as the rush of being on stage and winning something so big. For once, she achieves something. It feels incredible.)

They're back home at the Shays' apartment, and Freddie walks in all cute and upset. 

Wait.

They're back home at the Shays' apartment, and Freddie walks in all annoyed and upset and asks if they think he's funny. They stutter and sputter out little "yes"es that show Freddie quite clearly that they're lying, and Sam stands and watches as Carly follows him to the couch and sits mere inches away from him and asks why he cares.

He looks between them as he responds, seeming to act like he's talking to both of them instead of blocking Sam out like he used to. Interesting. Of course, he's still mostly focused on Carly, but Sam gets a little thrill in her chest for finally getting consideration from someone. It's tiny, it's barely there, but she appreciates it nonetheless. She doesn't show her appreciation, though, instead choosing to make snide comments throughout Freddie's rant and earning glares from both of her brunette friends. 

She's thankful that Spencer butts in, taking them to Galini's Pie Shop. Freddie's face when he takes the first bite of the best coconut cream pie he'll ever taste is absolute gold to Sam, and she treasures it for all it's worth (because it's pie, and she takes pie and first-time pie-eaters very seriously, and it's most definitely not related to the little bursts of feelings she's gotten for Freddie).

Everything disappears when he handcuffs her to Gibby. She's so angry she sees red at the edges of her vision. Did she really think she was crushing on Fredward Benson, nerd supreme, lord of the tick baths, Galaxy Wars fanatic? How stupid.

So when she realizes she can really get him good by exposing he's never had his first kiss, she does it. She does it without thinking. Because doesn't she do an awful lot of that? She jumps into things without cutting her losses. 

She's gotten good enough at doing cruel things and getting away with them that she doesn't really regret what she did to Freddie. Well, not at first. She doesn't think a first kiss is that big of a deal, so why should anyone else?

Wrong.

Things come back to bite Sam Puckett, and exposing that Freddie Benson has never kissed a girl before hits her hard. She's nearly nauseous when she hears about Freddie getting teased, mocked, and eventually putting himself in isolation, and revealing herself to never have kissed anyone before cures it a little, but she knows what'll really make it better so she's clambering onto his fire escape and offering him a meatball.

She thinks it's endlessly sweet that he watched iCarly from the balcony in his misery.

She thinks it's absolutely adorable that Freddie's nervous just to make the _proposition_ of being her first kiss.

She thinks that it’s kind of hilarious that she has to prompt the boy to lean and make the first move.

And now?

She knows that his lips are as soft as they look, probably due to his mother's incessant skincare routine. 

She knows that he smells like fresh laundry and cinnamon and tastes like orange chapstick.

She knows that even without practice, even with the most innocent of kisses, Freddie Benson is extremely good at what he does.

She also knows, because of what feels like a storm of butterflies rising out of crashing waves in her abdomen, that she's definitely, for sure, irrevocably falling for him.

xxx

Sam and Freddie's relationship has begun to resemble a bit of a friendship. Sam tells him she thinks Carter Ford is cute (although she conveniently leaves out the fact that she doesn't think he's as cute as the dorkwad is), they excitedly discuss going to an MMA fight to film iCarly, and sneak out together when Carly and Spencer begin arguing about the attendance of said fight.

"Where do you want to go?" Freddie asks, hands tucked into the pockets of the jacket he had nabbed from his apartment before they slipped into the elevator. Sam wonders if they look like a couple to passerby as they walk out of the Bushwell. Considering the generous amount of space between their two bodies, she's guessing they don't.

"I get to choose?" she asks slightly incredulously. Freddie rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, I don't know where to go so you can decide," he responds. "I don't care."

The rest of the day is spent at Pike Place Market, ducking and weaving through stands, grabbing samples off tables and giggling madly. Freddie wrinkles his nose as the two pass a stall selling fish and it makes Sam smile. She points excitedly at a butcher slaying chickens on the spot, and Freddie grins and shakes his head as she takes off and starts a conversation with the petite woman almost too pretty to have chicken blood covering her elbow-length gloves about chicken types. (Freddie has to drag her away after a solid five minutes on the topic, apologizing to the woman for not buying anything before yanking the blonde girl away with a surprising amount of strength.) Sam convinces him to buy them ice cream, and they alternate between licking at their cones and talking about iCarly, school, parents, and the latest gossip. They walk to Piers 62 and 63, shoulders bumping as they stumble down the sloped street, sitting on the stone steps and staring out at the water, and it is there that Sam discovers that Freddie learned Spanish because his father was half-Latino and, for once, chooses not to push the subject, leaving them in an awkward silence for a while.

"So. Uh." Freddie clears his throat. "Carter Ford?"

"What about him?" Sam fidgets with the end of her sleeve, shivering slightly as the wind blows. They're sitting side-by-side, Sam's right knee knocking his left as they absentmindedly swing their legs, her right arm pressed into his warm left arm. It's closer and more intimate than they'd care to admit, and they pretend the distance is larger by not looking at each other, instead enjoying the sight of the cloudy day seeming to push down on the blue waves.

"What do you see in him? Why do you like him?" His voice cracks on the word "like", probably remembering the way the basketball hit his face.

"I don't really like him. I just think he's cute." Her eyes narrow slightly. "Besides, I'm the only one who's allowed to pick on you. And why are you so curious anyways? You're such a girl, Fredwina. These are the kinds of things Carly grills me on."

"Have you told Carly about taking his basketball?" he bites back, not seeming to realize how innuendo-laced his statement sounds.

"No, I have not." She isn't planning to, either.

"Why?" His face is turned towards hers, trying to search for something in her expression.

"I don't know. I feel like she'd try to set me up with him or something."

"Don't you want that?"

Sam chuckles, trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice as she rotates her head, suddenly realizing how close she is to him, their eyes inches apart, bright blue mixing with warm brown. Her breath hitches for a second and she momentarily forgets what she's thinking. She wonders if he can read her mind from this close, if something in her face is betraying her right now and he can tell all that she's thinking. 

"Sam."

She blinks twice. "Yeah?"

"You can't avoid the question forever."

"The answer is no, Freduccini."

"Why?"

"That wasn't part of the original question."

He scoffs and rolls his eyes, but there's a tiny smile on his face, and Sam is infinitely relieved that she's off the hook. She shivers again, more violently this time, as the wind begins to pick up.

"Hey, are you cold?" His eyebrows are furrowed, eyes concerned.

"No, I'm shivering for fun," Sam tells him snarkily, crossing her arms and staring out at the Sound, the gulls slicing through the air. She doesn't pay attention to what Freddie's doing next to her, not really caring until his jacket is draped over her shoulders. The corners of her mouth tilt down.

"I'm not a fruit cocktai-"

"Shut up and take the jacket."

"I'm not cold!" She's looking at him again, and he's looking at her, and there's something so intense about him right now and she can't place it but it makes her insides bubble like the hot cheese fondue at one of the stands in the farmer's market.

"You just said you were!"

She opens her mouth to argue, but realizes she can't because he's telling the truth. He smirks. She socks him in the arm and he winces, and while his eyes are squeezed shut in pain, she subtly pulls the jacket tighter around her, melting into its warmth.

After around half an hour of more pointless conversation, the bright sky begins to dim and the two decide to begin their voyage back to the apartments, Freddie tugging a lazy Sam off the stone steps. She sort of wishes he'd held her hand a bit longer before mentally kicking herself for having such a girly thought.

"How do you think we should get iCarly to the MMA fight?" Sam asks Freddie as they begin walking back up towards the farmer's market, her hand brushing her with every step.

"I don't know. I mean, we'd have to be in the studio, because the webshow means we can't use the excuse of 'hanging at the Groovy Smoothie' to leave the house. How would we be in the studio and at the fight?" He looks thoughtful, lips pursued when it hits Sam.

"The lookalikes!" she exclaims.

"What about them?" Freddie asks, before realization dawns on his face. "Oh."

"So we'd go to the fight-" Sam starts.

"-and the lookalikes would stay at the apartment!" Freddie finishes.

"We'd be in both places at once!" Sam says excitedly.

"What if Spencer tries to talk to them, though?"

"Easy! We'll pre-record snippets of our voices! You can do that, you're a tech geek."

Freddie doesn't even bristle at the statement, instead choosing to look at Sam with such awe and adoration in his eyes that she goes a little weak in the knees. 

"You're a genius, Sam!" he exclaims and holds his hand up for a high-five. She smacks it, maybe harder than she should have, and smiles to herself in her victory.

"Did your mom give you permission to come out?" she suddenly asks. He looks at his shoes.

"I think she assumed I was at Carly's and left for the hospital."

"Why? Does Crazy have therapy there?"

Freddie glares at her. "Very funny, Sam. My mom's a nurse."

"I guess her overprotectiveness could be well-applied in a hospital."

"Sam!"

The conversation continues like this until they approach the front of the Bushwell Plaza.

"You coming?" Freddie asks, gesturing to the glass doors.

"Nah, I've got to go home today. Mom's out with the boyfriend of the week and I've got leftover ribs and Girly Cow calling my name." She grins lopsidedly, and he returns the smile.

"See you tomorrow, Puckett."

"You too, Benson."

It's only until she gets on the bus that she realizes she's still in his jacket.

(He never asks for it back. They never talk about that day again.)

xxx

Carly's always been a constant in Sam's life. She's been her shoulder angel, her best friend, and her only advisor. (Well, the only advisor Sam listens to.) Outside sources that meddle with Sam's life are immediately reported to Carly, who fixes her best friend's broken existence as well as she can.

When Missy tromps along, ready to tear up their friendship, Sam has nowhere to go. Carly is clearly not ready to believe there's bad in her childhood friend despite the evidence Sam presents, Sam's mom would never pay attention, and Spencer's gone on that trip with Socko (who Sam secretly suspects is the reason Spencer's relationships never work out).

She runs to Freddie, sniveling and desperate, and walks away feeling worse because, of course, he didn't believe that perfect little Missy was trying to ruin the best thing in Sam's life. The only thing that comforts her that night, lying in her bed and counting cracks in her ceiling, is how regretful Freddie looked when Sam explained that she's never come to him before and that she's coming to him now. She got through to him, miraculously, although she's pretty sure he won't do anything for her because she's never done anything for him.

She's shocked by how lucky she gets when Missy gets chosen for the School at Sea thing and when Carly overhears Missy trashing Sam. For once, the universe aligns in Sam's favor and she gets to keep her favorite person and get rid of one of her least favorites. She's a bit suspicious at how she got so lucky, but she was also suspicious when Carly wanted to be her friend and there turned out to be nothing icky about that. 

It's only later in the week, when she's walking past the front hall where Carly and Freddie are sitting close together and reading a book, that she discovers it wasn't luck that was on her side.

"Okay, Benson, you're too nice," Wendy says, and he looks up in confusion.

"Huh?" he asks.

"What? What'd he do?" Carly adds.

"You know that School at Sea contest last week?" Wendy starts, not noticing how panicked Freddie gets in an instant, gesturing wildly at her to stop. 

"Yeah?" Carly responds, not seeing Freddie's dilemma either, s he tries to interrupt with a quick "uh, Wendy" that the redhead pays no mind to. "What about it?"

"Bye, Wendy!" Freddie exclaims, trying to point her away. Sam narrows her eyes. What's he trying to hide?

"Freddie won it."

Sam's jaw drops.

"No, no, I didn't," he lies. (He's an awful fibber.)

"Yeah, you did." Wendy's tone suggests that this is extremely obvious.

"No, Missy Robinson won it!" Carly interjects.

"No, Freddie won it, and then he told Principal Franklin he wanted to give it to Missy," Wendy explains. She leans forwards and pinches hs cheek affectionately, causing a surge of jealousy to run through Sam's body. "Sweet boy."

 _Yes, he is,_ Sam thinks, tuning out of the rest of the conversation and slinking away, a wide smile etched onto her face.

xxx

Maybe Sam and Carly shouldn't prank Freddie so often.

Yeah, that not a normal thing for them to consider, but it can get irritating when Freddie is insistent that Melanie and Sam are the same person, just with costume changes and personality swaps.

Sam is _not_ Melanie. Nor will she ever be. Melanie's soft and sweet and giggly and perfect. She's Carly in different packaging, except maybe slightly less corrupted because she spends less time with Sam. How can Freddie even consider the possibility that they're the same person?

Right. Because she's always relentlessly cruel to him.

Although Sam was dreading Melanie's arrival, she finds herself enjoying the company (although she'll never admit it to anyone). She and Melanie take trips to the Groovy Smoothie together and talk about anything and everything they can think of. 

And for whatever reason, her sister will not shut up about Freddie Benson.

"Isn't he adorable?" Melanie sighs from her twin bunk, pushed against the opposite wall that Sam's bed is on. They're both laying on their sides, looking at each other from their respective sides of the room. Sam is suddenly thankful for the low light in their room as her face flushes crimson, from either embarrassment or jealousy.

"No," she says, her voice clipped. She hopes she sounds as exasperated as she feels. "Plus, he'd never like you."

Melanie gasps and Sam winces, realizing that sometimes their twin telepathy doesn't work perfectly.

"No, Mel, you're great! Any guy would be lucky to have you! The problem is, when the dorkwad looks at you, all he sees is me. Even if you wear a lot more makeup than I do."

"Oh. He only hates me because he thinks I'm you?"

"Exactly!"

Melanie shrugs happily, then continues with her rant.

"He's got these kind eyes, and it's like you can see everything he's thinking. They're not the boring kind of brown. It's like I can look in his eyes and see my favorite color. And his skin is so clear! How is his skin so clear? He's got a pretty good face structure overall, to be honest. He's very handsome, and when he's older, I'm sure he's going to break hearts. Oh, and he's super determined and persistent, too. Like, he refuses to believe I'm not you! You've really messed with him a lot, haven't you?"

Sam nods, then realizes she can't see her. "Yeah, I guess I have. I can't help myself! When I look at that nubbish face, all I want to do is make him miserable!" 

(That's not true. She's not completely sure what she wants to do to him, but it's something between the lines of kissing his face off, dating him, having tiny little Puckett-Benson babies, and dragging him to Denny's at 3 A.M. and forcing him to buy her food.)

"Well, all I want to do is kiss him and date him and hold his hand and study with him and be happy with him." 

Sam swallows.

Hard.

"Mel, get some sleep. You get all lovey-dovey when you're tired. It's gross."

The only response she receives is a high-pitched giggle, a mumbled "okay, good night", and the sound of her sister turning over and burrowing herself in her sheets.

Sam lies awake for hours, unable to get Melanie's words out of her head, finally letting the chirping crickets outside her window lull her off to sleep.

She's back in her bed a couple nights later, watching videos on her laptop when Melanie tromps in, looking radiant and sort of ditzy in her bright red dress and black net tights.

"So, how was the date?" Sam asks, closing her laptop and tossing it aside as her sister takes off her black heeled boots, still grinning.

"Interesting." It's a bland and somewhat negative response to what Sam thought she was going to say.

"Just 'interesting'? Not 'hot' or 'fun' or 'enjoyable'?" she grills.

"Why are you so curious? You've never really cared before." The ponytailed blonde ducks into their split walk-in closet, changing quickly into pajamas as Sam responds.

Sam shrugs noncommittally before realizing her sister can't see her. "Eh."

There's silence for a few seconds before Melanie bursts out of the closet wearing a matching pink satin pajama set, clutching a comb in her hand. "I know you've kissed him!" she exclaims in a rush, brushing her hair aggressively and frustatedly. Sam's eyes widen before she remembers to re-neutralize her face. 

"You really think I'd kiss the nub?" she manages to bite out without stuttering. "In his dreams. And if he dreams of me, I'm pretty sure they're only nightmares."

"Well, I kissed him," Melanie tells her, turning towards the mirror hanging on the door of their closet, angling it so she can watch Sam's reactions.

"Why would you do that?" It's not a snarky question—it's a serious one, laced with enough envy to make Mr. Brightside proud.

"Because I think he's adorable and I was trying to prove that I wasn't you. Instead of kissing back like a normal teenage boy who confidently asked me out on a date, he stared at me in shock, then got all defensive and went, 'you swore we'd never do that again'! Again, Sam? _Again?_ "

"I'm going to kill him," she mutters, standing up and grabbing a jacket.

"Samantha Puckett, are you trying to tell me that you're leaving for Freddie Benson's place at 10:32 P.M.?" Melanie asks from behind her. Sam swivels to face her.

"Sure, his folks don't mind." _Well, Crazy would, but it's not like I'm gonna barge through the front door._

"Sam!" she exclaims again, and Sam rolls her eyes and turns around, trying to act indifferent to the fact that her sister knows one of the biggest secrets of her life and she's dangerously close to discovering the other.

"Yeah, I kissed Freddie. I overheard him tell Carly he'd never had his first kiss, so on iCarly the next day, I exposed that fact to everyone! But then they started making a big deal out of it and mocking him and everything, so I told everyone that _I_ had never kissed anyone, then tromped over to Freddie's, apologized, had a deep talk with him, then we kissed to get it over with! There were no feelings attached, nor will there ever be."

Melanie seems to brighten considerably, before deflating again. "So him taking me out was basically an excuse for him taking you out?" she asks, and Sam's eyes widen as she rushes to her sister's side, staring at both of them side-by-side in the mirror. 

"No, not at all! Here, okay. What was he wearing?"

"A striped shirt and dark jeans."

"I hate stripes, and he did that to piss me off."

"Wow, you have one piece of evidence. Impressive," she responds.

"Seriously, Melanie-"

"No, Sam, listen to me. I think Freddie likes you."

Sam turns to her sister and places her hand on her forehead, trying to gauge her temperature.

"Are you ill? Did you eat anything at the club? Oh god, did you drink anything?" She tries to ignore the way her heart is thumping out of her chest at the mere mention of Freddie liking her. That's ridiculous. She's his blonde-headed-demon, the _thing_ he most definitely is not friends with.

"Freddie tried to grab us drinks, but girls kept trying to dance with him so he spilled them everywhere," Melanie giggles, twirling around and flopping onto her bed. Sam stays at the mirror, smiling slightly.

"Yeah, sounds like him. Anyways, enough about me because _I'm_ not the one Freddio went out with."

"You might as well have been," Melanie mumbles, staring at her sleeves. Sam chucks a pillow at her and she looks up, indignant.

"You could've chipped one of my nails!" she whines.

"Oh, don't be such a baby. Want to avenge your nail?" Sam grabs another pillow off her bed, holding it up. Melanie nods, plucking her own pillow and smiling.

"Let's fight."

xxx

Sam doesn't think when she jumps into things. This is a fact she's learned to accept.

It turns out that Sam's spontaneity mixed with laughing gas, however, makes for a deadly combination.

When Carly finds out that Sam and Freddie kissed, Sam automatically assumes Freddie told her, and is pissed off right away. Why would he tell the girl he's in love with that he kissed her best friend? Was he trying to make Carly jealous? Was he using Sam to make Carly jealous?

Then she finds out _she_ told Carly when she was on the loopy gas at the dentist's.

That's almost worse. 

Her subconscious mind is always on Freddie, and now Carly knows, and she's so close to discovering the real reason why Sam's constantly thinking about the nerd.

Instead of forgetting it like Sam hoped she would, Carly starts grilling them on what the kiss was like. Ordinarily Sam would run away, but she's stuck in place by duct tape and the intoxicating scent of Freddie's new cologne (although she pretends the latter doesn't exist and isn't heavily distracting her).

"How long was it?" Carly asks. 

"Seven seconds?" Sam's statement sounds more like a question, like she's struggling to recall the night that she wishes she could forget.

"And was it fun?"

"Fun?" Sam really can't believe her ears. No, it wasn't fun. It was terrifying and exhilarating and thrilling and strange all at once, but not fun. Fun's a word for arcade games and downing hams, not kissing the boy of your dreams "just to get it over with".

"Yeah! I mean, did you guys, you know, like it?" Carly clarifies, and that almost makes it worse because Freddie turns to her with this unreadable expression that could be anywhere between disgusted and confused, but suddenly the universe decides to bless Sam Puckett with the sudden arrival of Spencer Shay asking for his banjo. 

So now Sam's probably never going to find out if Freddie enjoyed the kiss or felt anything about it, and that's fine by her. 

(Not really.)

Anyways, the Girl's Choice Dance is coming up, and Sam's never really been one for dances but she's curious about Freddie's situation as she chews down the bag of bacon he gave her.

"So, any desperate girls ask you yet?" she questions, her voice sounding far too casual for her frantic mind. _Please say no, please say no._

"Actually, two." _Damn it, Benson!_ "Jamie and Ariana." 

"So, which one are you going with?" Carly asks.

"I haven't given either one an answer yet," he tells her with a meaningful look. "Unless someone else wants to ask me?"

"No," she grins, and it's hard for Sam to swallow because it's never hurt this much to hear that Freddie's still latched onto Carly like a koala to a tree.

The next day, Freddie walks up to her and tells her that the two desperate girls from yesterday got dates and revoked their offers. For a second, she considers asking him to the dance, but then she realizes he'd probably think of that as an elaborate prank set-up. Besides, he's going with "Magic Malika", he groans as he glances towards Gibby at the water fountain.

"Don't you have something to do?" He points at the boy, and now it's Sam's turn to groan. "You promised Carly you'd ask him!"

Sam doesn't miss how Freddie's eyes are trained on her the whole time he's teasing her. She passes it off as him wanting revenge for all the times she's mocked him. 

"Hurry along," he tells her, and she forces herself to tear her eyes away and propel herself towards Gibby. 

Gibby's rejection doesn't hurt her feelings at all—just confuses her a lot—but she slams him against the locker anyways and takes her frustrations with Freddie out on the smaller boy. 

"What are you doing?" Freddie demands as he walks up to her. 

"I was trying to do this boy a favor and he-" she starts, but Gibby runs away sobbing and Freddie's eyes follow him before snapping back onto hers. "See what you did? He got away!"

"What happened?" he asks. 

"I asked him to the stupid dance and he said, 'Nah, I'm good,'" she recounts in a mocking tone.

"Did someone else already ask him?"

"No!"

Freddie chuckles, and it frustrates Sam even more because she loves his stupid smile so much but hates that he's smiling as she got rejected so she grabs his collar and watches his features morph into panic.

That's more like it.

She releases him after a couple seconds, feeling too exhausted to continue. "Whatever. I'm going home."

He grabs her shoulder and spins her around, and the contact makes her fists clench and her heart begin to race like a scene from a bad chick flick. "Oh, no you're not. You're coming with us to the Groovy Smoothie today…" and she tunes out, watching his lips curl down in disappointment as he talks about all the potential dates of the girl he loves and wishes she could swipe the sadness off his face because she knows how he feels when he constantly watches Carly fall for any guy except him.

After all, doesn't he secretly break her heart the same way Carly breaks his?

She's at Gibby's house a couple nights later, insisting that he should come with her. Despite constantly beating him up, she knows he's a fun and nice guy, and they'd have a good enough time at the dance together without really liking each other. She's in the middle of telling him he doesn't have to be a loser and sit at home all alone when Gibby's reason for not coming shows up in the form of a pretty brunette.

(Because don't pretty brunettes always ruin the things Sam wants to do without meaning to?)

She awkwardly walks away, already knowing this is going to be a terrible night.

She goes to the dance, but it's more of an in-and-out thing. She sees the dancing and disco lights and gross couples and instantly walks out, headed to the Groovy Smoothie so she can sit at the table closest to the counter and talk to T-Bo while he works on the machines until closing time.

She saunters up to the door and walks into the colorful shop, ready to sip at a monster-sized smoothie until her head is numb and she can't feel anymore.

And then she stops dead in her tracks.

Freddie and Carly are swaying to the romantic track playing over the speakers, his arms wrapped tightly around Carly's waist, his hands splayed over her back, her head on his shoulder. He looks peaceful. Serene.

He looks happy.

Suddenly Sam's tightening her lips so that they don't tremble, and facing the glass door so nobody sees her eyes begin to water. She walks slowly out of the shop, taking her last glance at the perfect couple before starting to run down the street, feeling stupidly dolled up in her pretty dress with the wide skirt and metallic gold jacket. She runs and she runs and she runs, ignoring the staring passerby and street animals weaving between her feet as the wind whips at her wet eyes and brushes at her exposed legs, stopping only when she reaches home, fumbling for the key in her purse, ugly-sobbing as she sprints to her room and flops on her bed, purse clutched like a lifeline in her hand.

All she feels is a twisting sensation in her stomach and a damp pool near her eyes and all-consuming _pain_ as the image of her best friends together burns itself into her memory.

After a while, she rolls over and gets up, tossing her pretty flats off, stepping into the closet, and tossing a tank top with plaid boxers on. She guides herself to the mirror outside the door, grabs a comb, and racks it through her locks, not minding the way it tugs at her scalp, not stopping until her hair is untangled and smooth. She makes her way over to her bed and unpacks the little things she'd loaded into her purse. Lip gloss, gum (although she wasn't expecting any action tonight, especially from Gibby), bacon, and her Pearphone, which chimes as soon as she takes it out.

_Dorkwad: How was your night with Gibby?_

Sam furiously wipes the tears from her eyes, tossing the device back onto the bed, vowing to herself that she won't respond until she sees him in person, knowing she won't commit to that.

When does she commit to anything?

xxx

And while Sam usually doesn't think before she leaps, eats, or speaks, she's beginning to overthink every moment with Freddie.

Some things are simple. Her eyes are naturally gravitated to the way he licks his lips after eating cupcakes. She's starting to find his dorky Spanish hot. He's especially cute when he's embarrassed.

Other things are more complicated. 

She can't help the tingles that skate through her fear-paralyzed body when Freddie pulls her in after she almost fell from the window-washing platform with Carly. She wonders when he got so strong—maybe when the voice got deeper?—and doesn't miss the way he reaches for her even when she slides out of his grip and into Spencer's, the breathiness of his voice when he tells her he was worried out of his mind, how he stares when she starts to cry. He looks worried and extremely awkward, like he doesn't know what to do with his arms now that Sam's not in them. She thinks about it even when she's safe in the Shays' apartment, tucked into their couch because her mom's got company back home, wondering if he meant to reach for her like that.

When Freddie gets hurt, Sam's suddenly in a tizzy, grabbing a taco (because food relieves her stress, but nothing cures how she feels for Freddie) and running up to Spencer and thinking of how much he must love Carly to risk his own life to save hers. When she finally calms down, days after the incident, Carly tells her she kissed Freddie and Sam's all fluttery again.

"He just looked so cute there, with his bandaged head and his damp robe, so I kissed him!" Carly exclaims, sounding panicked.

Sam tries to force the resentment out of her tone as she continues questioning her best friend. "Okay, and were there feelings involved in the kiss? Did, uh, sparks fly? Oceans crash? Butterflies desperately tangle around?"

"Yes, yes, and no! Gosh, Sam, if you didn't hate Freddie, I'd assume _you've_ felt those things in a kiss before!" Carly throws her hands in the air in exasperation before storming over to the fridge. "I'm grabbing some Peppy-Cola. You want anything?"

"No, I'm trying to think about how your babies would look. Would they be pretty like you or ugly like the nub?" Sam is, in fact, thinking about the future of "Creddie", and what Carly said, and how long she's going to keep up this charade of hating Freddie until she cracks, but she doesn't want to think as far as kids. She doesn't think it'll happen, anyways, because she already knows that Carly's in love with what Freddie did and not Freddie himself. She forced the fireworks on herself, panicked out of confusion, and now she's pacing back and forth in her kitchen with her beverage sloshing out of the can all over the place, ignoring Sam's statement and muttering to herself and constantly touching her lips. Sam wonders if she's thinking of how soft Freddie's lips were, or if she noticed his new cologne the way Sam did. 

Sam teases the two, of course, calling them "Mr. and Mrs. Benson" (and feeling her stomach twist when Freddie tells her to stop in a tone that's probably supposed to encourage her to keep going). Right after Carly leaves, though, Sam gets honest with him, telling him that Carly doesn't really love him, partially because it kills her inside to see him eat her best friend's face like that and partially because she cares about his emotions and would rather have his heart broken sooner than later.

(She finds out from Carly the next day that Freddie told her all this "smart stuff" about her only thinking she's in love with him, and that they broke up. She finds it sort of weird that he listened that quickly, and that he cares about what she said.)

It's only a couple days before the lock-in, when Freddie's cracking his neck and knuckles and flexing his arms, that Sam realizes she doesn't only "like" him anymore, and is now delving into dangerously unfamiliar terrain in terms of feelings. For one, she thinks he's _hot_ now, which should be impossible because he's a dorkwad and a tech geek and in the AV Club, but Sam has to admit that puberty did him a favor and hit him like a train.

(She sort of loves it, too.) 

He's still weak compared to her, but he makes her struggle to win in arm wrestling now. (The thing is, whenever he touches her, even for the most arbitrary of reasons, the hairs on her neck rise and goosebumps tingle all over her body. He makes her weak in a completely different way, and probably on accident anyways.)

She's in a good mood all the time, bullying people less and dishing out compliments and smiling and overall being a lot more Carly-like. (Of course, she isn't on Carly's level, at full-Shay blast. Sam's not about to spit out rainbows and giggle and doodle "Mrs. Puckett-Benson" in the margins of her notebooks.)

She's started spending a lot more time with him, too. He takes her up on her offer to help with his and Brad's MoodFace app, earning her a spot sprawled across his bed as she researches and types up a list of emotions for them to use in their matrix. She fetches them sodas from the Shays' apartment and massages their shoulders when they get tired of typing, noting that Freddie got rid of his Galaxy Wars merch, instead filling his shelves with books and tech gear and picture frames, swapping out his old comforter for a simple blue-and-white quilt set. She constantly flits around his room, checking up on the progress on the app, mocking the boys for their nerd-speak at times (because she's still Sam and not a perfect angel), watching Freddie furrow his brows in frustration when errors pop up in the code and crack his knuckles before he gets to debugging.

Skip to the lock-in, which Sam's sort of excited for because it's a whole night spent with her favorite dork and a boy who's pretty good at making fudge. She makes fresh guac beforehand, which, at the event, Freddie thinks is some sort of radioactive poison/sleep drug, then drags her over to the side and starts aggressively complimenting her. She barely focuses on what he's saying, lingering in the feeling of his hand on her arm, still thinking about it as they conduct their third test of the app on Sam.

She watches him out of the corner of her eye, seeing his eyes drop open and begin to dart around, hands clacking loudly at the keyboard. She thinks he's worried, or maybe panicked.

"Can I move now?" she asks. 

He glances up quickly. "Uh, yeah."

"So what's her mood?" Brad asks, swinging the camera over to Freddie. He stutters, seeming to search for an answer, as if it's the hardest question in the world to answer.

"Uh. It's, uh." He looks between his computer and Brad with wide eyes. "It's inconclusive."

"No reading?" she asks as she grabs the bag of chips, knowing Freddie's lying because she's known him for years now and he still doesn't know how to bend the truth.

"It was working this morning," Brad tells her as he lowers the camera. 

"Yeah, I'm gonna see if Carly has any tissues," Freddie declares, slamming his laptop and running out of the door. 

Sam and Brad wait until he's out the door.

"He's lying," they blurt at the same time, then grin. 

"Well, he left the other laptop here," Sam remarks. Brad rushes forward and types into it, clicking a few times. His expression morphs into one that resembles Freddie's.

"What is it?" Sam asks, rolling her eyes and walking over, peering at the screen.

"IN LOVE."

Well, shoot.

She can tell Freddie informed Carly about her MoodFace reading, partially because of the way he ran out and partially because of how Carly tries teasing her about Brad before exclaiming that she knows Sam's in love.

Sam's secretly relieved as she walks away from her best friend, knowing they think she's in love with Brad and not Freddie, and that her secret can still be kept as long as she wants it to. 

She sees right through Freddie's "two-headed frog" charade, and Carly dimming the lights and locking Sam and Brad in the room together. They're trying to be matchmakers.

Instead, Sam turns on the lights, picks the lock, and sneaks out to Carly, informing her that she doesn't love Brad, denying her personality change, listening to her rant about how Sam's suddenly tagging along to everything Freddie and Brad do, and just barely keeping the truth from her best friend.

"Don't you want a nice boyfriend?"

_Not Brad._

She's sitting outside later, stewing in her misery. She must be out of her mind. She must be _crazy_ to fall this far for the boys he's supposed to hate. She can't find him attractive. She's not allowed to want a repeat of that day at Pike's Place, except with a lot more kissing. She's absolutely sure that all the Disney movies and pop songs are wrong, and that love is just a toll on the brain and bodily functions, something that'll break your heart and never make it whole. She doesn't want to confess her love, because it's a heavy word for her to throw around. Love is a bunch of engagement rings in a bag, promises melded into metal that were destined to reside anywhere but Sam's mother's finger. Love is, like she heard in that Arctic Monkeys song, "a studded leather headlock"—something to grip at her and force her into an uncomfortable state of submissiveness. Freddie was made for some kind-hearted girl, not one who's abused him since the day they met. She sips at her water, breathing heavily and glancing to the side, ready to make a run for it and go all the way back home.

"Yo, yo," Freddie greets her, peeking his head out of the doorway.

Dammit.

"Carly sent you to find me?" she asks, rolling her eyes, hoping for him to leave soon so she can die in peace.

He's persistent about getting her with Brad. She knows it's because he wants her to be happy, but he seems too eager to get rid of her and to pass her on to the next guy.

But they're Sam and Freddie. He pushes, she pushes back. She yells, he combats with logic. 

He's saying she hates him and she's telling him that no, she doesn't, and he's demanding that she has, citing her old birthday card to him. She tells him to leave. He says he will, but then he starts to talk again. She's suddenly so frustrated at him for never loving her or realizing her love isn't directed at Brad, and she lets her heart lead her to her feet, to just a foot away from him, threatening to beat him up. He's unfazed. He starts talking in this soft tone, discussing rejection (as if she doesn't have a degree in that subject), and all she can see are his lips, right there, so she leans in and lets it out on him in a much gentler way than expected.

She counts how long this time. It's eleven seconds of heaven and euphoria and the feeling of soft, still orangey (unmoving) lips against hers. It's eleven seconds of gripping his now rock-hard upper arms and feeling the muscle underneath her fingers, underneath his shirt. It's eleven second of pretending that Freddie Benson is hers and everything in the world is in her favor.

And then she's pulling back and he's in shock and she's actually apologizing for once, staring at him for a few seconds, watching his eyes dart around and shoulders begin to unstiffen.

Regret washes over. Then nausea, ten times worse than when she exposed Freddie's kiss-less existence. The sirens go off in her head, like police cars and a screeching baby Spencer, and she's running away, feeling a wave of déjà vu wash over her as she recalls that night of running away from the Groovy Smoothie, hearing him call after her but ignoring it because he's not going to chase her as she clambers over the chain-link fence and runs away from the school, wishing she could run away from her life forever.

xxx

Sam's secretly weak. She doesn't feel affection towards things easily (unless they're Carly or food) and she's begun to regret her actions. She thought she had solid, impenetrable walls, until Fredward Benson came along and slowly undid her.

(She's 16 years old and she knows nobody's going to break her heart like he does.)

**Author's Note:**

> if you made it to here, congrats! i'm sorry for any grammar/spelling mistakes—this is NOT beta read—and if this seems too long or stretched out or shitty. this is my first work and i really worked hard on it omg


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